


Ceremonial Bonds

by botgal



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human/Troll Society (Homestuck), Body Paint, Bulges and Nooks, Bullshit Religious Ceremonies Involving Sex, F/M, Horrorterrors - Freeform, Human Anatomy Meets Troll Anatomy, Human/Troll Relationship, Partial Mind Control, Tentacles, Xeno, an actuall tall adult karkat, classpects
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-17
Updated: 2017-04-17
Packaged: 2018-10-19 21:59:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10648875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/botgal/pseuds/botgal
Summary: As the Seer of Light, it is her duty to speak to the Horrorterrors of the Furthest Ring, and deliver their words back to her people.As the Knight of Blood, it is his duty to keep her bound to this world, and keep her from slipping away from it forever.A ceremony older than time itself brings these two together, again and again, as they share in this ancient, quiet place. As if their bond is the only thing that exists in the world.





	Ceremonial Bonds

**Author's Note:**

> I indulged myself some smut RoseKat again. Yaaaay. Hope whoever reads this enjoys it. Though lord knows how few of ye will bother reading it anyway.  
> If you do, hope you enjoy.

The ceremony was not one to be taken lightly. Not with all that rode upon it. It was one which he had participated in time and time again, but each time he went into it with just as much a bubble of nervousness in his gut as he did the last time.

The length it took just to 'prepare' him for the event didn't help matters much. A lengthy bath where he was soaked in herb-infused water with temperatures just below scalding while trolls and humans with cloth-covered faces felt like they scrubbed his outer layer of skin clean off of him. Then once out, rubbed dry until he felt raw.

Thankfully, there was a break as they prepared the next part of it. Everything had to be fresh and clean and perfect for the ceremony, of course. Nothing but the most essential symbols could be reused more than once. Which is why, as some of the attendants were grinding up dried red shoots with ash and other such things, he was being given a mixture from the ancient silver cup always used. Sip by sip. Something they claimed would help... _sustain_ him through the ritual, to keep him vigorous in his efforts. By the time it was empty, the mix would be done, and he would be holding back grumbles of humiliation as purified hands swept intricate patterns of swirls and lines across seemingly every inch of his bared skin. In the center of his chest, a sharp diagonal slash was drawn out, three large blobs of color extending down from it.

Blood. The whole reason he was a part of the ritual to begin with. Such an odd aspect, and a rare one at that. Of course he, who was a genetic anomaly amongst his own kind, would end up with such a duty in the grand scheme of maintaining things. They marked his symbol on his body in ash and paints of a recipe older than the memory of even the longest-lived Fuchsia in history. He was fed more of the beverage in as they painted across him. The last thing they did once the paints were fanned dry was to slick him seemingly from head to toe in softening oils scented with fragrances he wasn't certain existed anywhere in the mortal plane past this shrine. They tried to do it quickly, before he finished the fourth and final cup. So sweet like honey but not. The ingredients unknown to him and, to be honest, he felt like few knew what really made it up. Lest they try to know, and go too far in their quest for knowledge to ever return with their sanity.

The moment the cup was pulled away from his lips for the last time, he was hauled to his feet and felt them tie a thin piece of red cloth to him at each of his hips. For modesty. _They_ couldn't care less if he walked in dressed in ten layers, or clad in only his own skin. This was for convenience more than anything. Whatever he walked in there wearing, he wouldn't be wearing it for long.

The only other piece of cloth he was granted was a blindfold tied tight around his eyes. Though everyone knew the chamber was somewhere down past the great stone doors in the shrine's deep basement, no one knew just _where_ it was. That was a path only _They_ knew the way to, no mere mortal could traverse the underground maze as they so pleased.

Once it was securely tied, Karkat was led to the basement. The stale, cold air from down below rushed up to greet his bare skin. Though he knew there was no such touch, the wisps of ominous breeze from down below felt like thin, cold tendrils grazing his body. Even if he wanted to hesitate, there was no way for him to do so. His feet seemed to move of their own accord, taking him away from the reassuring hands and words of his friends who had prepared him, and descended into the depths.

He never for a moment felt afraid that he would stumble or fall. Whatever force that guided him didn't want him to be stopped. Though the more minor of the lesser _They_ would be happy if the ritual could be made to descend into chaos, as was _Their_ natural element, the most ancient of _Their_ numbers would not agree. Things were done a certain way for a reason, after all. Those higher in _Their_ ranks kept a kind of order among the chaos _They_ sowed. While his fellow in this ritual was what brought _Them_ down with _Their_ knowledge, he was the counterweight; making certain that she didn't fall too deep into the downs to never again return as herself.

He knew he had arrived when he felt his feet stop, and the odd sensation of having his body back to himself, even though he logically didn't feel any point before when he had lost it. A heavy stone door shut with a muffled grinding behind him, but he still stood there.

“You're finally here.” He felt a hand on his face, a blessed spot of warmth in the cold underneath of this labyrinth. She must be reaching up to feel his face, knowing how small she was. A waif-like thing, in spite of all her mental and spiritual fortitude. “I've been waiting.”

He moved his hands forward until he feel her sides in his palms, slide them down to her hips where he could feel the edge of the long skirts she would have been clad in. Her soft, perfumed skin was smooth with clean oils to the touch. Though he couldn't see, he knew she must have long ago shed her ceremonial robes while waiting for him. Though the length of her skirt was greater than his meager waistcloth, they were on equal ground at least as far as garments went.

“Hey, you know how long it takes to be prepared. Not my fault everyone else is slow as hell.” She chuckles, soft and sultry to his ears. “At least _They're_ patient. I'm sure as hell not.”

She managed to slip her hands around behind his neck, pulled him down so he was leaning until he felt a pair of lips against his. She still didn't remove his blindfold, the gall of her. Leaving him blind still to their surroundings. They kissed, slow and soft, with her still holding on to him. However, when he slipped his thumbs beneath the waist of the skirt, she pushed him back, holding a finger to his lips.

“You'd best save that eagerness for the ceremony, 'Hero of Blood'. We have a long night ahead of us.”

He let her lead him further into the sacred room, until she took him by the shoulders and pulled down, coaxing him down with her into the familiar pile of velvety softness.

“You going to take this blindfold off of me, or am I going to have to do it myself, Lalonde?” He asked brusquely. In response, however, he simply felt the weight of her enter his lap, and her arms wrap around his shoulders. The way she was sitting, a leg on either side of him, there was very little cloth between them. So very, very little...

“Hm... not yet. I think I'd like to enjoy this, just for a moment.” He could only tell she leaned in by the way he felt the softness of her chest against his. For how powerful she was, she was so tiny in comparison to him. She must have been leaning up into him in order to kiss him on the lips again as she did, even perched on his lap. He relaxed into it, putting his arms around her waist to pull her flush against him. Her breasts pressed into his thick, toned chest. To him she felt so small and soft, while to her he was big and coarse. But they liked those things in one another.

He slid his hand down the length of her spine, following her slight curves until it came around to cup her ass. In turn, she moaned softly into the kiss, sending goosebumps up along his back. He wanted her. He wanted her so badly, and not just for this ceremony. It wasn't just the way she felt against him or even all the aphrodisiacs he had been made to take during his preparation (which even now he was feeling coursing through him and taking their effect). He knew her power and her mental fortitude, and he wanted to share all he had with her and receive what she would give in turn.

He would have wanted to draw out their kiss longer, but a streak of cold swept through him, the barest edges of a whisper from a breath of frost and white shadow. They pulled back at the same time, breathing heavily after their long embrace. They both knew without saying why. _They_ grew impatient. It was time to begin.

“... Are you ready?” He was still breathless, and it showed. He heard another intone of her laughter, and felt something pull loose behind his head.

“Of course.” The blindfold fell loose from him, and he opened his eyes slowly. Ready to take her in.

She sat there before him, in all her radiant beauty. Like him, her body seemed to glisten slightly in the dim torchlight of the chamber, slick with perfumed oils. She was decorated with painted on designs, made to look like her skin had shimmering gold etched into it, unlike his dark, solemn reds. In the center of her chest, a brilliant, golden sun shone out to his eyes.

Light. The aspect of fortune and perception. Gatherers of knowledge of the best paths that must be taken. A well known, respected aspect for one to hold.

For a Seer, especially one set for this ritual, even better.

The duty of the Seer in this ritual was a simple one. In order to gain _Their_ knowledge and spread it to those mortals who would need it, she would open her mind to _Them_. Let _Them_ into her head so that _They_ could whisper _Their_ secrets and _Their_ visions to her, without the risk of driving her to insanity by having such things breathed into her ear. As so many have tried and failed to accomplish. There was never a lack of risk, of course. Too many times in the ancient past (and the recent), Seers had attempted to hear these whispers to recount them to their brethren. Only to have their very minds lost to the depths of the Furthest Ring where _They_ resided. Never to return or breathe with true life again.

That was where he came in.

In order for the ceremony to succeed, and Rose return with all her senses intact, she required an anchor; someone to help keep her tied to the mortal realm even as she listened to the murmurs of madness and things to come. Pull her back if she drifted too far, and bring her home again.

As a Knight of Blood, one who protected the bonds he held close to himself, he was the best suited to the job. It was why _They_ guided those of the shrine to him, brought him among _Their_ worshipers and servants, so that he could make certain _Their_ Seer always returned to her fellows unharmed.

Rose closed her eyes and let out a steady breath, focusing on what she couldn't see, but which she could See. Vast, empty expanses of starless space with only the glowing, wavy protrusions of the many-limbed things that she lived to serve and relay _Their_ whispers to the faithful.

Her whole body slipped into a subtle chill. Dripping down her skin like drips of water from freshly-melted ice. She began to See and Know. She understood the secrets being murmured straight into her mind, from all she had learned and all she was taught by the ones who murmured them to her.

Her skin grew colder, but the whispers were not something she could simply pull away from. It was far, far too late for that. She began to drift; her sense of self was no longer her, but a mere abstraction she was hardly aware of any longer. How long had it been since she had her physical body? A minute? A year? She couldn't say. She was lost amongst the glowing white amidst the blackness, and there seemed to be no escape.

Then, a heat came. Smooth and warming at her neck. Something warm touched her body that wasn't the tendrils of those that she worshiped whose whispers still tugged at her. She heard still, yet she still came back to herself slightly. The warmth ran down her neck, leaving a trail of warmth as something else touched her body. Something cupping her breast. A soft, breathy hum trailed past her tightly-pressed lips. She craved the heat as much as she craved the knowledge she was receiving.

Karkat never could wait patiently until she was fully immersed in _Them_ , as he was always taught to. He always took the first chance he saw. When her skin seemed to darken past the shade of gray his was, and her beautiful violet eyes glowed with only white. He leaned in and kissed at her neck. How icy her skin was under his touch now, sea dweller cold. It wasn't right. He had to warm her and keep her with him. However he needed to.

He kissed at her neck and her shoulder, leaving little, gentle bites along her skin that never drew blood. With his hands he massaged her perfect, pert breasts. Her nipples were already hard and ready to his touch. The little sounds he got from her told him he was doing it correctly, and he proceeded on. Even with all his touches, the streaks of gold over her skin never smudged or faded. His hands were smooth over her body with the thin layer of oil on both of them. He didn't even mind it on his mouth, it had no taste to it.

Soon enough she was leaning into his touch. Her skirt rustled when her thighs rubbed against one another in search of another sort of friction. Her body was cold and sensitive to any sort of touch she could get. Anything that wasn't cold and numbing and _Them_.

He released one of her breasts, replacing it with his mouth while his freed hand trailed lower over her. It paused only a moment at her side so that he could pull the tie that held her skirt together, and let it fall down around her legs. He slipped his hand between her legs, mindful of his claws, and ran his finger along her warm, already moist entrance.

Rose arched into the touch she felt already so low. The whispers grew louder and more frantic, but so did the touches. She felt like she was being tugged between both: the flow of understanding to her mind and the constant, warm touch that was the only sensation she had of her body.

Her lips parted in a soft gasp when she felt that heat that had stroked her slipped into her. She involuntarily clenched tight at the feeling, but then relaxed as another flow of _Their_ whispers came to her. The heat rubbed at her inner walls, sending constant, minute waves of shivers of heat through her to combat the cold of the Furthest Ring where her mind resided. She tried to clamp her thighs around the heat best she could, to keep it there and keep that hot, pleasurable feeling in her.

She was too weak, too induced to relax to succeed in doing so, but still it stayed.

Karkat kept up with his ministrations on and on, trying not to push things too fast. They wouldn't be allowed a release until the ceremony was finished, of course. Not so long as _They_ still had things to relay to their Seer. But he still wanted to draw this out as long as possible, for Rose's sake. He increased his fingers in her from one, to two, to three, until he felt her spasm and clamp onto him hard over and over again without release. Even in the dimness of the torches he could see how her skin flushed red in need of his touches. Her half-open eyes still filled with glow and haze, but at the same time, a kind of desperate need.

Once or twice, he could swear he felt coldness trace over his own skin, but he ignored it for the most part. Sometimes _They_ who resided in the lowermost tiers liked to reach out during the ceremony. Those ones were the ones who fed on the most basest forms of chaos and mischief; to interrupt would bring about a moment of despair, which would be fed on. He couldn't stop just for that. He'd felt _Their_ touches before, anyways. It hardly unnerved him anymore.

He tried to keep going as long as he could, but suddenly he felt arms on his shoulders, and Rose suddenly pulled herself up closer to him. Just about into his lap. It took him by surprise a moment, but he tried to go with it. She was shifting her hips to grind into his hand, trying to get him in further even though his fingers were already buried inside her up to the knuckle. Perhaps it was about time, then.

His free hand left her breasts, much to the protesting whine she let out, and pulled at his own waistcloth. Letting it fall to the ground alongside her long-discarded skirt. His bulge, which had long ago unsheathed and had been staining the fabric covering it with thick, red slime, swayed searchingly in its new freedom. Aching to find what his body knew would be there.

Rose gasped and let out a whine when the touch she wanted so desperately left her, she let out a choked moan that was half pleading and half pain. She _needed_ the touch and heat now. All else was so cold. The sounds in her mind were overwhelming and nothing in the Furthest Ring was warm. She needed to be heated and she needed to be touched.

She hardly noticed her legs being spread apart until something slicked across her and sent stars in her vision. She gasped, the sensation bringing her back to her body more than any touch before. It rubbed back and forth across her, a slow, torturous teasing that made sounds escape her body and her hips try to grind down on what she could feel and what she needed.

Then, all at once, she felt it bury itself wetly inside of her, and the room she could hardly feel awareness for echoed with the sounds of her moans.

Karkat could hardly help his fingers digging into her thighs as he moved her over his bulge. It felt like such a relief to finally be inside her, just the scent of her had been driving him near to madness. Let alone the cold of her skin and the desperate way she tried to grind into him. The appendage thrashed inside of her while he moved her up and down over it. She was still too weak and too detached to ride him properly, but he made do. It worked either way. His nook and bulge both dripped with prematerial, feeling her squeeze and clench around him the more he worked her. Their breathing came equally ragged from their exertions; his in the body and hers in the mind.

The only way it could be better would be if he could have something in his nook, but that didn't matter at the moment.

What mattered was her, and that he could keep her in balance.

He tried to keep her on him, moving her with all his strength, but as he felt things coming to a head, he eventually gave into the temptation. He leaned her back until her back was pressed into the soft sheets, pulled her legs up around either side of him, and thrust his hips into her harder than he could manage before.

The effect was instantaneous. Her back arched and she let out her loudest moan yet. She could have came then and there had she not still been in the throes of _Their_ knowledge.

He only realized too late that he could feel cold tendrils stroking over his body again, only more insistently than before. He tried to ignore them, focus on her only. But that was too difficult to do when he felt a sudden, cold intrusion enter his nook.

He let out a strained sound of pleasure, his hips bucking in an extra hard thrust. The touches were insubstantial, not truly physical, but his nook clenched around them as if there were really something inside of it. It only spurred him on, though. Urged him to move faster between the heat on his bulge and the cold filling his nook.

Rose eventually found her arms again as the whispers died and she was let go, and the forces on her body became more real to her. She held onto him tight as she could and half-muttered his name. Urging him in broken, whispered sentences to go harder, faster, and harder again.

Their release came suddenly, when the powers which held them in the ritual let them go. Karkat buckled and pressed himself into her as deeply as he could while his nook spasmed and his bulge released a flood of material into her; while Rose clutched onto him, digging her perfectly manicured nails into his back while her own inner walls clenched him tight as if they were trying to milk him of all he was filling her with.

The two lay there for several minutes after, panting with exhaustion and basking in what was almost a physical glow between them. The aftershocks still made them tremble slightly, but overall, they were satisfied.

It was Karkat who was able to move first, pushing himself up on still trembling arms so he could hover over her.

“... You okay?” He asked in a gruff, tired voice. She smiled up at him, just grazing his cheek with the edges of her fingers.

“After that? Fantastic.” He laughed breathlessly, and she propped herself up on an elbow, just enough that she could kiss him again. This time, just light and soft. Affectionate. “And I have plenty to share with the others when we go back.”

He let out a shaky sigh, relieved that it was over. It felt great for a while after, but always exhausting. They may well have been at this for hours and he had no idea, so detached this place was from the rest of the world. Either way, it was always draining emotionally as much as it was physically.

“Fucking great. Think _They're_ gonna kick us out now?”

“Hm... no.” She kissed him again, and laid back down, beckoning him with her eyes to join her in the comfortable place she lay in. “We've done what _They_ wanted. No one will mind if we rest here, just a bit longer, before head back.” She pressed her palm to his cheek now, and eventually managed to coax him into lying down beside her.

At some point, neither of them knew when, the signs of what they had done were gone. Not a trace of sweat or any other liquids lingered on their bodies or in the sheets or pillows. Their hair was still mussed, and they were out of breath, but they both knew. _They_ would never allow this place to be soiled for long. They could stay as they liked, but not a trace of evidence that anyone was ever there would ever be left behind.

So, they relaxed into each other and closed their eyes. Seer comforted in the embrace of Knight, and Blood strong and satisfied knowing it had once again protected Light.

 


End file.
